Instead of looking at Data Visualization as a system of oppressed and oppressors, I suggest we understand that we are all just wondering in the dark. Everything around us is a representation of the imbalanced power structure – since ‘power structure’ and ‘balance’ can never go hand in hand.

In the military intelligence community, any source of information that has been consciously processed by humans is automatically ranked as a less reliable source (news reports, lectures, social media posts…), and that’s not by chance. Therefore “…We must acknowledge data visualization as one more powerful and flawed tool of oppression” is an important criticism, but one who fails to understand that all things can be seen as tools of oppression since all data representation is distorted based on the creator values scales and worldview.

Even the most socially aware designer can’t take all voices into consideration, I will argue that they can take only their own voice into consideration.

I found Kurgan piece closer to my experience analyzing geo data under the expectation of forming a coherent story. The term “emptiness and abstraction” describes this feeling well, and a major step in the understanding that even though it’s a fairly accessible source of information, it’s a complicated one to draw conclusions of (as she well demonstrates at the beginning of the piece). When trying to draw conclusions from any kind of source, one must ask himself what is the nature of that source, while cross-referencing with other sources of information if he wishes to suggest an assumption. “… The putatively scientific and objective interpretations […] tell only a story, not the story, of what is going on in these images.”

The British philosopher Alan Watts once said: “…When we examine our bloodstreams under a microscope we see there’s one hell of a fight going on. All sorts of microorganisms are chewing each other up. And if we got overly fascinated with our view of our own bloodstreams in the microscope, we should start taking sides, which would be fatal, because the health of our organism depends on the continuance of this battle. What is, in other words, conflict at one level of magnification, is harmony at a higher level. Now could it possibly be then that we, with all our problems, conflicts, neurosis, sicknesses, political outrages, wars, tortures and everything that goes on in human life are a state of conflict which can be seen in a larger perspective as a situation of harmony?”

I believe in our ability as a society to emerge from the oppressed and oppressors system. The only way to do so is to cease from seeing ourselves as victims of oppressive systems and understand that all information presented to us has been manipulated for various reasons. There is no absolute truth, and what we see as power struggles are actually an important part of forming a healthy society. That will allow us the flexibility to hear and include many voices and narratives, fearlessly.

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For my final project, This time I would like to avoid all political aspects and map the one thing which I think we can agree is the closest to an objective description. Clouds – using the weather API of the open weather map, and some nice illustrations.

Last semester I’ve created a game using the Global Landslide Catalog,I tried to use the same DB to create a clustered map. I transformed the CSV into a geojason – but it seems to be something wrong with my arrays.

I found out:1. How to print a flock of birds in python.2. That you can find Moods by Hoffmann online in English3. I don’t understand grammar in any language, and I do not know left from right. I think once my mother told me I was dyslexic.

on December 10, 1978 Isaac Bashevis Singer summed up his speech at the Nobel Banquet with the words: “Ladies and Gentlemen: There are five hundred reasons why I began to write for children, but to save time I will mention only ten of them.”

– Part 1 –Gorey: Well I think that is, for the… I would say off hand that was fatal for an actor to have an image of themselvesI: You mean to be attached to any…Gorey: Or something I mean, you know, I don’t do this kind of thing, or this beneath me or… I mean I can say… I mean I can say this show is right for me, but not being… not… not because… not as a blancked thing… or… I don’t know, or anything that was even very obvious necessarily. I mean what kind of… two shows that seem very much alike one might be good for you and one might not. that’s like illustrating a book, some books I can illustrate some I can’t, and only I know for sure.I: Project by project bases…Gorey: Yes. Not that I haven’t illustrated a lot of books I was no good for, but, only I realized it, or at least as far as I knowI: What would those be?Gorey: Well… oh I can think of… oh I have done more awful work that you believe humanly possible. I don’t like to think about it. I like to take the positive attitude and open up my little portfolio ‘oh isn’t that nice!’ khhhh… anyhow…

– Part 2 –Gorey: Have you ever seen ‘Suture’? Well, it was made… it appeared on Sunday.. and so… I think at 1994, and it was made by two man’s names I presume they were young, and I’ve never heard a word about them since, and anyway… It is, absolutely the most deadpan movie I have ever seen. It starts out with a man driving to the airport in some place like Salt Lake City or Sante fe or somewhere or other. and, hmm, he picks up his brother at the airport, and you discover that he is going… he hasn’t seen his brother in a few years, but he has asked his brother to come and testify because he is being sued by somebody about something or other. They go back to his house, which is very obviously, hmm, a car dealership building. It is surrounded by concrete parking lots, and the building itself is kind of… you know… western modern. The living room is this huge open floor, obviously where the cars were displayed. And there is a stairway going up the side and there’s where the bedrooms are and everything. And, anyway, as the two brothers are driving back from the airport, they are talking about their past, and “Remember who nobody could tell us apart?” “Remember that trick we played on so and so?”. And so one of them is black and one is white. This is never mentioned in the movie. Never. And all through the movie, people confuse them. And at the very end, the white brother girlfriend goes off with the black brother.I: By accident?Gorey: Well.. You would… This is… It is never, never, I mean obviously they were sitting around one night and said wouldn’t it be great to do a movie about.. I’m not even sure… I’m not sure that they referred to as twins but they practically are… I mean… virtually they most be identical twins or people wouldn’t be mistaken them for each other all the time obviously! And they thought “this is a great idea for a movie!” and they went… they went ahead and did it. And it’s got quite a good plot, I mean it’s kind of involve… there is… hmm… and… one or two people you’ve seen before but everybody else which you’ve never seen at all. And it is just… you know I just set after it was over and I thought “I have never seen a movie like this. it’s really great!”.

– Part 3 –Gorey: Well, I think I’ve been influenced a lot by things like… Well you know Lewis Carroll and Edward Lear, The whole tradition of English nonsense first and stuff. There are a couple of people from the late 19 century who sort of do long, well much longer poems but in… not very clever rhyme schemes, and, you know sort of narrative things… No, of course, I suppose it goes back to Thomas Hood, Who wrote some very strange, you know some really quite violent, not necessarily for children, but I think they… haaa… I’m not sure if they appeared in ‘Punch’ or not…But I think, you know it was a whole thing I don’t know where you can find the actual first, first person who ever did this, but I suspect it goes back even further than we think. But I mean like like Lear you know was a great friend of Tennyson or something, and some of his stuff very sounds like Tennyson, you know, going slightly askew… Of course, some Tennyson sounds like Tennyson going slightly askew… whatever. Anyway.

– Part 4 –Marion Vuilleumier: Since we’ve talked briefly about the children’s books, and I like to mention two. This one: ‘The Loathsome Couple’ what’s the Loathsome Couple doing? Gorey: Laughing. well I… I’m starting from this one-off.Vuilleumier: Well I tell you…Gorey: This is by far my most unpleasant book, and I…Vuilleumier: Oh, oh well, alright. We won’t talk about ‘The Loathsome Couple’ we’ll talk about another one. Haaa… in fact here is another one over here that is kind of interesting. ‘The Utter Zoo Alphabet’. So tell me about that one.Gorey: Well that was one that was more or less as much intended for children as it was for adults, but, but probably by that time I was… am… the publisher… I think… who published this?Vuilleumier: This one is…Gorey: Oh it was…Together: Hawthorne.Vuilleumier: Mmhm.Gorey: Which was sort of… it was the same editor I… I mean it was the, for my, editor who I had for years now was first there and they didn’t have children’s book department, as I remember or something, so… There again there was a question of you know, there was no…Vuilleumier: Mmhm. But this reminds me kind of like an Edward Lear, because there is this the ‘Humglum’, and they… and the ‘Dawbis’, and you start to make up words, aaa… the ‘Epitwee`s’ and so on, and yet, they do look like ‘Epitwee`s’! now don’t you think those look like ‘Epitwee`s’ folks? I mean it is interesting how you take names and they seem to aaa.. to fit what you are talking about.Gorey: Well it’s one of those things, that’s you know in a sense the hardest… some… one of the hardest parts, sort of, writing a suitable name, because…Vuilleumier: Yes. I suppose. Yes. Ah, I…

It seems to me that the key to creating a physical experience in a virtual space, with an emphasis on a ‘zero frustration’ policy, is to create flexible systems that have room for the forgiveness that exists in the physical world. Systems which take into consideration our range of motion and the necessary learning curves.

I’ve created a version of the original Skifree game from 91′, controlled by scattered black beans – a controller which is not binary, without buttons. The tactility of the beans and the monster that lurks around the corner creates a funny experience that ranges from a sense of control to complete release.

The first point where I realized I’m onto something was at Pcomp user testing session:

After a few weeks of failed solutions to combine Pcomp and ICM:

I just let go. It turned out to be the best choice for both and started working with the web camera, analyzing dark and bright areas in the picture and added a figure.

From there I moved to lentils under a camera and a screen.
ICM user testing and iteration:

Back to the web camera for game mechanics and graphic:

Once I moved away from the web camera into the beans table + projection on top of the beans, it was way easier to understand the game mechanics needed, the necessary indication for a user to understand that the beans control the game:

The biggest challenge on that point was to limit the camera field, and understanding how to translate this limited field into the game axis (+ avoid dispersing beans on the entire floor).

It was tremendous fun to invite people and watch them play in order to improve. I got to know a lot of people on the floor, and some friendships came out of this playdate.

Another nice moment was on the final presentation where 5 people played together – up to that point I saw only one person playing at a time.

On a personal note, on the first post in this class, I wrote: “I’m an Illustrator, I read a lot and have a nice sense of humor – my way of learning is by trying things I believe will trigger a positive reaction. Once I find the right ground to experiment and let go of all worries, no matter in which field – doors to different kinds of knowledge I didn’t even know exist reveal themselves and there is no greater pleasure.”

I thought of enclosures which exist in nature – marched into Whole Foods – and purchased a small bag of chestnuts for 1.95$.

1. Cut them in half using the band saw2. Coated the sawed nuts from the inner side with glue3. Asked Marco, Sam & Koji to write their New Year’s wishes4. Inserted the wishes into the empty nut5. Sewed the nuts back together